page_title: Shabbat meals
section_title: Friday Night Meal
hierarchical_section_title: Shabbat meals / Friday Night Meal
caption_attribution_description: English: Photo of two homemade whole-wheat challos placed on a decorative olive-wood cutting board and covered by a traditional embroidered Shabbat challah cover. Photo taken on March 31 2006 by Yoninah.
context_page_description: Shabbat meals or Shabbos meals are the three meals eaten by Shabbat-observant Jews, the first on Friday night, the second on Saturday day, and the third late on Saturday afternoon. The Hebrew word for meal is seudah, with the plural version being seudos or seudot, thus the Friday night and Saturday day meals are often called seudot or seudos. The third meal, held on Saturday afternoon is called either shalosh seudos, seudah shlishit, or shaleshudus.
context_section_description: The Friday night meal traditional begins with the singing of "Shalom Aleichem", a song welcoming the angels that the Talmud says visit every Jewish home on Friday night. This is often followed by the singing of "Eishet Chayil" (Proverbs 31, also pronounced "eishes chayil"), a song praising the Jewish woman.
  In most communities, the singing of "Eishet Chayil" is followed by kiddush, the Jewish practice of sanctifying the Sabbath over a cup wine or grape juice. Following kiddush, the meal continues with handwashing before eating bread. The meal then begins, with the head of the household lifting up two challah breads, and reciting the blessing of Hamotzi. The challah is sliced, dipped into salt, and eaten. The meal continues with festive foods (often chicken), often with singing and sharing Torah thoughts.
  In many German-Jewish households, the washing for the bread is done before kiddush, instead of doing it right before the blessing of Hamotzi and the eating of the challot. This is so people don't wait around in between kiddush and handwashing, as people often do. Instead, they can eat the bread without getting up.
  It is customary at Ashkenazic Shabbos meals to eat "gefilte fish" at the beginning of the meal, a dish made of ground, deboned fish, commonly carp, whitefish, pike, and Nile perch. Chicken soup is also commonly eaten at the Friday night meal.
caption: Two whole-wheat challot
exif: {}